Ha! I just made a coast/neutral button!

[Gorfllub]

I used to be concentrating on regen. But after reading here I switched more to coasting.

I like E/B modes, but it makes it more difficult to switch to neutral to coast.


So, I made a switch that switches to neutral from any gear!


The switch drives a couple of relays. When not pressed, life is normal. When you press the button, it disconnects the signals to the shift switch and sends it straight to the N setting.

Easy as pie and works great! The hardest part is deciding where to put the button itself. I think I could get one to work into the side of the shift knob. Could also get it to work from the cruise or radio switches in the steering wheel. Unfortunately I don't have the steering wheel with buttons in it. But I am going to try to find one. (I think someone said its the same as a lancer maybe? Mits dealer here says no. But they also don't know anything)

Currently the switch is on a tether and I just lay it in the back cupholder when not in use. When driving, I hold it in my hand. It has a small grip in it, like something maybe used in presentations to move to the next slide.

Right now I have cut and soldered into the shift sensing wires, but I sent pics of the plug off to my wire harness manufacturers to see if they can get both male and female versions for a reasonable price. If so, it will be extremely easy to make a plug & play kit with zero cutting/splicing/soldering.

I have seen a lot of shift knobs with buttons on the side, but they are typically for muscle cars and I don't like the looks of them. (Big round ball) But that may be a way to go.


And to expand on this, I grabbed a momentary (on)off(on) rocker and am going to maybe use the other side to either switch to B or tap right into the brake pedal position wires and force a high-rate regen.....



Good times and my first "mod"!

 

[Gorfllub]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Widr3oMnVg

 

[Don]

If your switch carries the current to power a relay, trying to use the steering wheel switches may be problematic - They are low current switches which are used to short out various mini resistors to send control signals on the buss. The clockspring in the steering wheel would not carry much current either

But - A switch on the shift knob sounds like a really good idea. I'll be interested to see how you do this, as it's something I've thought about for a long time

Don

 

[Gorfllub]

The current draw is minimal. Just the coils of a couple of relays. Maybe 60-80ma total.

The steering wheel switches would handle it directly without any fuss. Other than the fact they are multiplexed.... So would just build a very basic circuit to "pick" the button you wanted to use. Then when that was pressed it would determine its seeing the right voltage and send an output to trigger the relays.


On the module under the seat, orange plug, is where all the shift signals are sent.

The shift select switch has 2 switches in it. Likely for redundancy. So we need to access both at the same time.

Since I am not really set up to post pics on some hosting site then link them here, I am not going to post any pics right now. (Like WTF? So cheap they think a few pics will drive the bandwidth through the roof?)


Basically there is a blue and a pink wire side by side. These send out the signal to the shift sensing switch. Each is for its own half of the redundant double circuit.

Cut those in half. Attach pin 30 of a relay to the side going to the connector. Pin 87a goes to the other half of the cut. Pin 87 goes to the appropriate "N" sense wire.

Hook pin 85 to the light green wire in the same plug. (With a 2a fuse for safety) Hook 86 to your switch/button. Hook the other end of your button to ground.

Now do the same thing for the 2nd circuit and done!

But like I said, if the plugs are available for a reasonable cost, I will make a bunch of plug-in units.


My background is 12v / auto electrical. Not EE level stuff, but I have been wiring cars and making custom / modding circuits for them for nearly 30 years. Not so good at Canbus capture and coding though. I think my brain is too old to absorb much more info!

 

[Gorfllub]

https://www.ebay.com/itm/White-Punisher-Skull-Push-Button-Side-Mount-shift-knob-M10x1-50-U-S-MADE-/222986699473

Lots of knobs like this. Even plain with nothing engraved in them, but I dunno......

 

[jray3]

Thank you Gorfllub- many have dreamed, but now one has done it!

 

[kiev]

@Go, Great job on solving this puzzle.

Take a look under the silver panels on your steering wheel--i pulled the blank one off (right side) and found a 4-pin connector under there. i haven't traced it out to see where it goes, but they may have put the clockspring in all the cars. Wouldn't that be sweet to have a rocker switch right by your thumb.

 

[Gorfllub]

My 12 doesn't have the silver panels.

It's solid grey and 1 pc. Nothing removeable


So I am looking for a wheel off a lancer to see about a transplant. Plus I would like the audio controls in the wheel for when I upgrade to a DDin head unit.

Hoping to find one with shift paddles to see if I can make something work there.

 

[Gorfllub]

Actually, looks like the paddle shifters go on the column and not the wheel.

Hmm.

 

[Luddite]

Since I am not really set up to post pics on some hosting site then link them here, I am not going to post any pics right now. (Like WTF? So cheap they think a few pics will drive the bandwidth through the roof?)

My background is 12v / auto electrical. Not EE level stuff, but I have been wiring cars and making custom / modding circuits for them for nearly 30 years. Not so good at Canbus capture and coding though. I think my brain is too old to absorb much more info!

Great information, thanks.
This is something that I would like to do too as it will reduce wear on the shifter.
Since I live where they use salt on the roads in winter and it frequently rains, my shifter cable has been stuck before. On one occasion, the car was stuck in park due to this and I couldn't move it. The button should enable it to be put in neutral so that it can be towed/pushed if need be and of course be very useful for coasting.

Is there any way you can post some pictures online?
https://postimages.org/ is pretty simple to set up and no account needed.

Alternatively, you could PM me and I could post them.

Many thanks

 

[Don]

Personally, I think I'd rather have the coast switch on the shifter. My Volt has about 20 switches on the wheel and the max regen paddle behind the wheel is HUGE, but even so, it's not always easy to find when you need it if the wheel is turned. A switch on the shifter is always in the same place, very easy to 'find' without hunting for it

I do hope you can find a source for the needed connectors and make up a few of these 'plug and play' so we won't have to hack up the cars stock wiring. I know I'd buy a couple

Don

 

[Gorfllub]

The pics I took aren't very detailed. But I'll take more pics later.

So far first harness manufacturer doesn't have that plug available to them, but they are looking for it.

I haven't priced it from mits (if it's even available) but it's probably extremely expensive that way.

A tiny 2 pin plug for a Dodge is $90 from the dealer. 20 cents from the plug manufacturer. Lol.


I still want the steering wheel with switches regardless. But I know what you are saying about too many buttons. Looks like the paddle shifters are really long so that they are accessible from virtually any wheel position.

May have to start drilling holes in my shift knob next week.

 

[Gorfllub]

Also, this will not fix a vehicle stuck in park.

The cable physically makes it so the car can't move.

Electrically tricking the car into thinking it's in neutral won't disengage that physical "lock".

 

[kiev]

Which connectors would you need--the mating pairs at the gear position sensor or something under the seat? i'm putting together a Mouser order for mating connectors for the MMCS radio navigation unit and the accelerator pedal, so could get a price and add some to my order.

 

[Gorfllub]

Need male and female of the orange plug on the module under the rear seat.

But I usually see if one of the manufactures I deal with has them available before going that route.

It would be good to know if they have them though.

 

[kiev]

Those orange plugs are a special cable-to-pc board connector from JAE Electronics, a 28-pin MX7 series automotive connector that neither digi-key or mouser carry or have any in stock. There is no cable connector mate, it only connects to a PC board, and there are 2 different sized pins for power and signal. It will be an expensive mess of kit to fabricate a plug-play box for this, if you could even source the parts.

i noticed that the EV-ECU side of the connector has the Mitsubishi logo. It is a 119-pin PC board header into which the 4 connectors plug: A lt blue 35-pin, B lt blue 26-pin, C Orange 28-pin, D Green 30-pin. They can be seen underneath the BMU which sits on top of the EV-ECU in this photo.

 

[richijennings]

Brilliant work! I'd started researching this exact same idea a couple of days ago, but you've got a lot further than me.

I figured the best place for a switch is actually on the left footrest—essentially a foot switch akin to a clutch pedal. And it means you don't need to take your hand off the wheel to reach for a shifter button.

 

[kiev]

i used a small flat blade screwdriver to release the Orange secondary wire lock, then used a small allen wrench (0.028") to depress the tab and extract the sockets for D and B and swapped them. Now i shift directly into B from N. A small sewing needle or pin might work also, insert it into the "T" shaped slot and apply slight downward pressure to release the catch tab, then pull back on the wire to extract the socket.

Housing drawing here: http://www.jae.com/z-en/pdf_download_exec.cfm?param=SJ028728.pdf
Socket drawing here: http://www.jae.com/z-en/pdf_download_exec.cfm?param=SJ037507.pdf

In this picture Pin 12 is the 5th position over from the right in the middle row

Q.E.D.

 

[Don]

i used a small flat blade screwdriver to release the Orange secondary wire lock, then used a small allen wrench (0.028") to depress the tab and extract the sockets for D and B and swapped them. Now i shift directly into B from N.

So, are you saying that you have switched 'B' to where 'D' used to be . . . . right below 'N' on the shifter? You just click it one notch forward and back to coast now? That would be a real improvement . . . . but I still like the idea of a coast switch

Don

 

[kiev]

Yes that is it exactly. i like the idea of a switch also, but this will do what i want--drive around in B and N using just one slot. i wanted to have either max power and braking, or coasting, with just one short shift.

No button, no soldering, no relays, no cost, and easily reversed back to OEM config.

[EDIT]
Drove the car in to town and it worked great, just as expected.

Later in the hot afternoon on the way home something tripped out and it threw the RBS, ! HV, Aux Battery, ASC lights and then went into Turtle, and the gear position on the fuel gauge was blinking. Stopped and restarted to READY and drove home with no more drama.

Not sure what tripped it, but i may have been shifting to N really fast while the regen was really high in B mode. i will test it some more, probably drive without the rapid shifting B-N-B-N, and then try to get it confused again. Checked the aux battery, 2 yrs old, measured 13.11 OCV, added some water to all the cells, those closest to the terminals were slightly lower than the rest.

Shifting to N while at max regen is probably a dumb move--there is a lot of energy stored up in the rotating magnetic field that will need to be dissipated, and blowing up the MCU would increase operating and repair costs beyond any benefit from this mod...